Harold Shipman: Doctor Death, review: 20 years on, this documentary offered little new insight

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Harold Shipman 
Harold Shipman, Britain’s most prolific serial killer Credit: BBC

It’s 20 years since Britain’s most prolific serial killer was unmasked. Harold Shipman: Doctor Death (ITV) recalled the shabby circumstances in which his crimes came to light – Shipman’s incompetent forgery of an elderly victim’s will, discovered by her solicitor daughter. And the shock experienced by investigators and the local community in Hyde as, in the weeks that followed, the list of victims grew from one into dozens and then, potentially, hundreds.

Shipman killed on an unprecedented scale. Following his conviction on 15 counts for murder, a public inquiry identified more than 200 victims, with the true number possibly higher than 250. Yet as crime documentaries go, this one never really got to grips with the fallout from his murders. We met some of the police team who uncovered them, and who still clearly bore the emotional scars of the experience. We met a journalist who, when reporting on Shipman’s arrest for forgery, was told by one local: “You mean Dr Death? He’s a good doctor but you don’t last long.”

More intriguingly we heard from a policeman who arrested Shipman for drug offences in the Seventies, and his horror at the GMC’s failure to strike Shipman off at the time. Which, with the benefit of hindsight, would have saved many lives. Oddly, whether Shipman was prosecuted, and if not why not, went unmentioned.  

Nor was any reference made to the fact that, long before Shipman’s arrest, concerns had been raised in Hyde by locals, including the coroner, about the high death rate among his patients. Something the police, who failed to investigate those concerns adequately, were criticised for during the inquiry.

In the end, though, the biggest hole in this documentary was any insight into why Shipman committed his crimes. He took his motives to the grave when he hanged himself in 2004, but there must be theories at least. Two decades on it seems inadequate to simply pick over these terrible crimes without giving any indication of what might have been behind them and what has been done to prevent such a thing occurring again.